Communication satellites typically operate within regulations that allocate at least one operating frequency bandwidth for a particular communications service and specify, among other things, a maximum signal power spectral density (PSD) of communications signals radiated to the ground, etc. A growing market exists for provision of high data rate communication services to individual consumers and small businesses which may be underserved by or unable to afford conventional terrestrial services. To advantageously provide high data rate communication services to such users, a communications platform may provide a high PSD so as to enable the use of low cost subscriber terminals, and efficiently use the licensed bandwidth so as to maximize the communications throughput for a particular licensed bandwidth.
Typically, frequency reuse plans are developed prior to design and deployment of a communication satellite in order to most efficiently service the projected needs of the system. For example, a series of spot beams may be deployed that implement a repeating color re-use pattern, where a color is a unique combination of frequency and polarization. In prior systems, it has been found that some spot beams can be oversubscribed while other spot beams can be underutilized. This situation is not the most effective use of resources.